


No Weddings and a Funeral

by anonymous_yet_again



Category: Psych (TV 2006)
Genre: (but it's in later chapters so the tag was added later), (self-harm isn't how Shawn deals), Angst, Case Fic, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fake Character Death, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Self-Harm, but also Shawn deals with things through, mostly as an excuse for angst, seriously my working title was 'angst galore'
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:28:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 19,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25632103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymous_yet_again/pseuds/anonymous_yet_again
Summary: There’s a new serial killer who’s been terrorizing Santa Barbara, and subtle clues suggest that Shawn is next. (It’s the note saying “Shawn Spencer, you’re next,” that’s the subtle clue.) With such a blatant threat, and no leads, there’s only one thing for Shawn to do: fake his own death and start planning a baller funeral, of course.  It’s only for a few days, everyone will be fine, even Jules.  Even Lassie.  Right?__________Content warnings (if applicable) at the beginning of chapters.As always, please let me know if you think warnings aren't clear/specific enough.Whole thing is written, editing in progress. Updates 2-3 times a week.
Relationships: Carlton Lassiter/Shawn Spencer
Comments: 111
Kudos: 277





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Another multi-chapter work set somewhere nebulously in the _Psych _time-frame! I am now actually watching the show so I have fewer excuses for mistakes (as when I wrote my last fic, which was before I’d watched any episodes) but hey, it’s for fun, so bear with me. When I started this story I had watched through season 3, which was kind of my context for the interpersonal relationships at the start of this fic. But as I write this note (and as I edit) I’m halfway through season 4, so we’ll see how it holds up.__

“Gus, don’t be a Ritz Bits cracker sandwich with extra cracker and no cheese,” said Shawn, as they climbed the front steps of the SBPD.

“That...would just be three small Ritz crackers,” said Gus.

“Exactly,” said Shawn, “and no one wants that! Too dry. No, you’re just wrong to say--” They pushed through the station doors and he trailed off, forgetting what he’d been arguing with Gus about. “What happened in here?”

It wasn’t that it was particularly chaotic inside the station; for once, in fact, it was quiet and oddly somber. But Shawn was used to being able to slip in and around and overhear conversations for at least five minutes before anyone noticed him--or, more likely, he got tired of being ignored and announced his presence--and this time, as he and Gus rounded the corner towards the bullpen, what felt like every officer in the place looked up at them and trailed off in their conversations. Gus and Shawn stopped walking and looked around. “Dude,” said Shawn out of the corner of his mouth, “I told you, you should have gone with the plain shirt.”

“They are _not_ looking at us because I’m wearing a patterned shirt, Shawn,” said Gus. “It’s a subtle, yet eye-catching array of small diamonds, it’s not like it’s one of your dad’s shirts.”

“Right, right,” said Shawn, “of course.” He was going to keep going, mainly because when everyone looked up, Gus had looked even more nervous than had become normal these past couple months, and arguing was distracting him. But the chief came out of her office before he could say anything else.

“Mr. Spencer, Mr. Guster,” she said. “I was just going to call you. Would you come this way?”

“Sick, she wants us on a case,” said Shawn, taking a step to follow the chief, who hadn’t actually waited for them to respond before walking away down the hall.

“Shawn, we’re already on a case, we’ve _been_ on a case,” said Gus. The case was why he’d been generally nervous lately. “The Astrology Murderer? This doesn’t look like something new.”

Shawn was forced to agree, for a couple reasons. One was that Lassie and Jules had walked out of the chief’s office right behind her, and they had similar somber, almost concerned expressions to the whole rest of the station--except Officer Martinez, who never had any expression, and Officer Lewis, who was fairly new. The other was that they’d just followed the chief into one of the conference rooms, where they’d been sticking all the information they had on the Astrology Murderer so far, and there was a whole new set of photos spread out on the table.

Gus whimpered a little but, to his credit, did not run away. Jules and Lassie came into the room, still weirdly quiet and serious-looking. Shawn walked over to the table and looked the photos over carefully. “Mary Martin,” said Chief Vick as Shawn slid a photo closer, “twenty-nine years old, found this morning when her neighbor noticed that her car was still there despite the fact that she works early shifts at a local bakery, Bouquet of Flours.”

“Is her neighbor young, male, and single?” said Shawn.

“Yeah, he _did_ keep weirdly close tabs on her,” Jules confirmed, “and there’s some texting history to suggest he’d tried to ask her out and been rebuffed, but he has a solid alibi and besides, he was really devastated.”

“He checked with her workplace before calling the cops,” said Chief Vick. Shawn raised an eyebrow. “Yes, he had the number for the place she works, we’re keeping an eye on him, but like Detective O’Hara said, creepy as this guy may be, he isn’t our killer. But we already knew that.”

“Unless he’s way creepier than he seems,” said Gus. He seemed to have worked up the courage to approach the table, and was looking sideways at the most gruesome of the photos: with every kill so far, the Astrology Murderer had carved a zodiac sign into the torso of the victim, and this girl had been no exception. “That’s a gemini,” said Gus.

Shawn had suggested calling the serial killer--Mary was the fifth victim--the “Zodiac Killer,” but apparently that name was already taken. “What’s a gemini?” he said.

“The sign the Murderer, um, cut onto this victim,” said Gus. “Also, you, Shawn, _you’re_ a gemini.”

“So are a lot of people,” said Shawn, waving his hand. The other thing about the zodiac signs was that they weren’t the sign of the person killed; they were always the sign of the _next_ person to be murdered. “It doesn’t mean that _I’m_ supposed to be next, I mean, come on…”

“No, but this might,” said Lassie, striding forward and tugging an evidence bag out from under a folder. There was a note in it, written in what looked like partly blood--ew--and partly ballpoint pen, probably because blood was hard to write with. _Shawn Spencer, you’re next_ , said the note.

“O- _kay_ ,” said Shawn slowly, as Gus whimpered again. “That _is_ a little bit more convincing…”

Shawn managed to convince the chief to let him and Gus leave the station without a police escort, at least until the afternoon. So far, the Astrology Murderer had only killed at night, and only people who were on their own; Shawn promised to stay with Gus and mostly in public, and also to go back to the station later to get a protective detail. He even intended to keep some of those promises.

“How can you eat?” said Gus, pacing around the Psych office. “The killer knows your name _and wants to kill you_. You’re going back for police protection, right?”

“I can’t,” said Shawn shortly--he _was_ eating, but to be totally fair, he wasn’t really tasting any of the white cheddar popcorn he was slowly moving to his mouth. It was mostly something for his hands to do while his mind spun.

“Excuse me?” said Gus, stopping in his pacing to spin and stare at Shawn.

“Listen, you and I both know this killer’s had it in for me from the beginning,” said Shawn. “All right, it was a hunch at first with the dead cat at the first crime scene--you know I love cats--and the smashed crystal ball in the apartment of that lady with no other psychic pater familia.”

“You mean paraphernalia,” said Gus.

“I’ve heard it both ways,” said Shawn, waving a hand and sprinkling cheese dust. “What I’m trying to say is that at the last crime scene I may have, uh, tampered with the evidence.”

“What?” said Gus.

“I grabbed a piece of paper,” said Shawn, “before the police could see it. A piece of newspaper, to be specific.” He pulled open his desk drawer, wiped his hand on his pants, and pulled the newspaper clipping out. Hey, at least he’d stuck it in a ziploc bag after he’d swiped it, even if that bag had originally contained pretzels.

“That’s the story about you breaking up that smuggling ring last month,” said Gus, and then added slowly, “Is that big X over the photo of your face written with...blood?”

“Sure looks like it,” said Shawn.

“You’ve been in danger for a _week_?” said Gus.

“I’ve been in danger all my adult life, dude,” said Shawn. “I ride a motorcycle and catch criminals. And also, more specifically, this person’s been threatening me with clues at the crime scenes for...over a month, now. But we can’t let the police put a protective detail on me. It would cramp my style. Plus a few other reasons. Luckily, I know _exactly_ what we need to do instead; I’ll explain, but first, I think we’re gonna need to bring my dad in on this...”

***

Carlton didn’t actually have a huge amount of work to do that couldn’t wait for the morning, and it was starting to get dark, but he wasn’t going to leave until he saw Spencer come back into the station for his protective detail. He suspected O’Hara was in the same boat. As he glanced at her, she got up from her desk, stretched, wandered nonchalantly to a spot where she could see farther towards where Spencer's assigned protective detail--McNab and Lewis, for the night--were waiting, and then came over towards his desk. “Shawn should be in pretty soon, right?”

“He should have been in an hour ago,” grumbled Carlton, and then trailed off. A Spencer was coming around the corner now, walking towards the chief’s office, but it was Henry Spencer, not Shawn, and he was looking even more stone-faced than normal. Carlton frowned.

O’Hara followed his line of sight, then turned to meet Carlton’s eyes and frown back. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” said Carlton. The chief had let Henry Spencer into her office and closed the door. Carlton rolled his chair back to see if he could catch their expressions. “Damn it, where the hell is Shawn?”

“He’s never been the most responsible,” said O’Hara, sounding a little like she was trying to convince herself. “Or the most punctual.”

Carlton grunted. Spencer the elder came out of the chief’s office after only a couple minutes, shook her hand, then headed back out of the station. He glanced over at Carlton and O’Hara as he left, looking slightly--guilty? Worried? Sad? They looked at each other again, but before Carlton could decide to call out to Chief Vick and ask her what was happening, she looked over at them and jerked her head beckoningly. “Detectives,” she said. “A word, please?”

“Sit down,” said Chief Vick, once O’Hara and Carlton were in her office with the door closed. “Please.”

She was saying “please” way too often to be offering any sort of good news. Carlton sat gingerly. Chief Vick took a deep breath. “I wanted to tell you both,” she said, “because I’m going to have to announce it to the station, and it will probably be in the papers tomorrow, but I wanted you to hear it privately at first. And, of all the people here, you two worked most closely with him.”

Carlton got a very bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. It pressed down heavily, turning his legs numb. “Chief--” he said.

“Oh no,” said O’Hara, breathlessly. She shook her head. “Not--”

“I’m sorry,” said the chief. “Shawn Spencer was in a motorcycle accident this afternoon. A truck ran him off the road and down a steep incline, somewhere outside our jurisdiction; he was taking a joyride past Goleta. One last--one last solo ride before he had to have police protection. Henry says he would have been killed almost instantly.”

Carlton had a lot of questions, but he couldn’t find words for them. He thought he probably had a lot of feelings, too, but mostly the numbness seemed to have taken over, spreading up from his legs, making his tongue feel thick and his head heavy. He turned it, slowly, and saw that O’Hara had her hands over her mouth and her eyes were shining. “No,” she said again.

Carlton turned back towards the chief, half expecting Spencer to spring up from behind her, laughing at the looks on their faces. Instead, it was just Chief Vick, looking composed, but with her eyes shining just like O’Hara’s. “I’m sorry, detectives,” she said again. “If you need to take any time off work--”

“No,” said Carlton. “Not--Chief, I can’t--we can’t--we have to catch a killer.”


	2. Chapter 2

“Your dad’s back,” said Gus, peeking out through the blinds at the streetlamp-lit parking spaces. All of the windows of the Psych office were covered.

“Cool,” said Shawn, staring at their clear dry-erase board. He’d recreated the crime scene notes from each of the Astrology Murderer’s killings from memory. “Let him in.”

“All right,” said Henry, who seemed to have let himself in. “I did it. Had to call in _two_ favors to get a falsified accident report for you.” Shawn turned around and frowned a little, not at the favors.

“Wait, Dad, do you still have the copy of the key you made?”

“Of course I do, Shawn, I carry it on me,” said Henry, patting his pocket. “Don’t worry, I locked the door behind me.”

“Hmm,” said Shawn, turning back to the board. “If I’m going to be sleeping here I’d rather there be fewer people with keys, rather than more.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, you can’t sleep here,” said Henry. “There’s a serial killer after _you_ , specifically! You’re staying at my house.”

“Dad, the whole point of this is that the killer _thinks I’m dead_ ,” said Shawn. “No one’s going to try to kill me if they think I’m dead already. And Gus can just pretend to be extra hungry and bring me meals when he comes in to check on the plants or whatever mid-day.”

“We don’t have any plants, Shawn,” said Gus.

“Well, you’ll just be mourning me, then,” said Shawn. “Whatever, there’s some stuff in the kitchenette already.”

“No, Shawn,” said Henry. “I’m going along with this because, against all odds, you’ve convinced me it’s the best thing to do--and I’m sure you’d have tried it _without_ my help if I’d said no--but you’re _not_ sleeping here alone. You’re coming to my house where I still have a taser and a service weapon, and sleeping in your own room.”

“ _Fine_ ,” said Shawn. “I’ll come stay with you and your disturbingly high number of hidden stun guns. But I’m not done here yet.”

“I’ll wait in the truck,” said Henry, and stomped towards the door. Then he paused and looked back, and said, “I sure hope this works, Shawn. You’re really hurting some good people with this stunt, and if it doesn’t work, you’ll be hurting them for no reason.”

“Always with the snappy exit line,” muttered Shawn as Henry left. He frowned at the board again.

“I still don’t fully understand,” said Gus hesitantly, perching on the couch nearby, “why we can’t just let a few more people know--like Jules and Lassie, maybe the chief. If the whole plan is to catch the Astrology Murderer at your funeral, shouldn’t we have some back-up?”

“It’s true that the Astro-Mur is likely to come to my funeral,” said Shawn. “I’m trying out new abbrevs for the killer, by the way, what do you think of Astro-Mur?”

“Sounds like a weird aquatic space superhero,” said Gus.

“Yeah, maybe not what I was going for,” admitted Shawn. He bit the end of his marker, then remembered what he was saying. “Anyway, the Murderer apparently hates me and _is_ likely to come to my funeral, to gloat and-slash-or make sure I’m dead, but I’ll need to know more than that to be able to catch him--or her.”

“Them,” suggested Gus. “Singular ‘they’ has actually been in use for a surprising number of years--”

“Right,” said Shawn quickly, cutting off what would no doubt have been a fascinating monologue on gender and grammar, “so, I don’t know _nearly_ enough to narrow it down to one person, but I’m already pretty sure of one thing about him or--about _them_ : they’re someone who is trusted at first glance, so that they’re let into people’s houses without a struggle. They’re someone who knows me--not just from the papers, but well enough to know when my birthday is. And they’re someone who’s been pretty dang good so far at not leaving any concrete, identifying evidence at a bloody crime scene.”

“That’s three things,” said Gus.

“They all _add up_ to one thing, Gus, I was doing, like, a narrative--never mind,” said Shawn. “Where in Santa Barbara can you find a pool of people who are generally trusted by the public, know me fairly well, and also know a lot about crime scenes?”

“Oh,” said Gus, with dawning comprehension (Shawn had always liked that descriptor). “You think it’s someone on the _inside_.”

“Yes, someone in the SBPD,” said Shawn. “Which is why police protection could have turned out to be a really _bad_ idea. ‘Inside’ is kind of a little vague, you know--”

“I was doing my own narrative thing, Shawn,” Gus parried. Someone outside honked a car horn. “I think your dad’s still waiting.”

“All right,” said Shawn. He tossed the marker over his shoulder to the floor--Gus followed it with his eyes disapprovingly--and grabbed his overnight bag. “Check no one’s watching outside, and then I’ll run to his truck.”

***

“Carlton,” said O’Hara, and he pulled his hand down from his mouth quickly. Biting his nails had never been one of Carlton’s vices before, but he’d already cracked all his knuckles, and biting his pen hadn’t felt distracting enough, so he’d started chewing his fingernails down during the couple hours he’d already spent in the room full of Astrology Murderer evidence. “Did you get _any_ sleep?” said O’Hara, bringing two mugs of coffee into the room and putting one down on the table.

“Did _you_ get any sleep?” Carlton retorted, picking up his coffee thankfully. O’Hara looked as put together as always, except that there were dark circles under her eyes, and a slight slow carefulness to her movements that Carlton recognized from late night stake-outs they’d been on.

“Not much,” said O’Hara, coming over and looking at what he’d been looking at.

“Me neither,” admitted Carlton into his coffee mug. He’d actually fallen asleep quickly once he’d finally gone to bed, exhausted, but then he’d woken up early--like, 4am early--and had the vague feeling that something was wrong. _Then_ he’d remembered that Shawn Spencer was dead. After that he’d just laid on his back, wide awake, until it made more sense to come into work early.

“Do you think,” said Carlton, once they’d looked through all the files again and come up with nothing new, “that, um, it was the Astrology Murderer who was driving the truck?”

“I don’t know,” said O’Hara. “It wasn’t really the normal MO. Or the normal time frame--there’s always been at least three days between murders.”

“Yeah,” said Carlton. He realized he was biting his thumbnail again--there wasn’t much nail left to bite--and dropped his hand to shove it into his pocket instead. “We can ask the chief if Henry Spencer said anything was suspicious.”

Two minutes later the chief was looking at them both with entirely too much compassion. Carlton started gnawing on his thumbnail again. The nail was now shorter than he’d ever even cut it, so he moved to the skin next to it. “I know it would be easier for you both if it was a crime to solve,” Chief Vick said, “but Henry said it was just a sharp turn and a legitimate accident; the truck driver even stayed and was processed at the scene. Again, if you want to take time off, I’m happy to approve it--otherwise, we _do_ have plenty of actual murders to be working on.”

Shawn Spencer had been killed in a freak accident. That just didn’t sit right with Carlton--not necessarily because it wasn’t true, but because it _shouldn’t_ have been. Spencer should have been taken out by a crazed gunman while saving Guster’s life, or a spectacular explosion as he solved a case. Or even by this latest serial killer. An _accident_ made no sense. “Got it, Chief,” said O’Hara, next to him. Carlton heard it as if from a distance. Some kind of strong emotion was welling up in him, and he did _not_ appreciate it. He wasn’t going to get emotional in the station. He bit down harder.

“Carlton,” said O’Hara, suddenly much closer, “you’re bleeding.”

“Oh,” said Carlton, and looked at his thumb, then up at the chief and O’Hara, who both looked concerned. “Just thinking. I got distracted. Thanks,” he added, as O’Hara grabbed a tissue from the chief’s desk. She didn’t hand it to him; instead she picked up his hand and pressed the tissue to the tip of his thumb herself. It wasn’t dripping blood or anything, though there were a few spots that were--oozing now. “I got it,” said Carlton, and pulled his hand back gently to take hold of the tissue himself.

“Listen,” said O’Hara quietly, as they left the office, “I get it, Carlton. I miss him, too. You don’t have to, but if you need someone to--talk to, I guess, or--”

“No,” said Carlton, and then felt a little sorry for being so short.

“No, right, _talking_ isn’t really a thing you--” said O’Hara immediately, backpedaling and trying to laugh.

Carlton tried to be as sincere as he could. “O’Hara--Juliet. Thanks. I just need--to be distracted. Let’s go catch some bad guys.”

“Yeah,” said O’Hara, looking relieved, and Carlton realized that sometimes she was more similar to him than anyone probably thought. “Let’s do that.”

***

By the time Gus arrived at Henry’s house, Shawn had cleaned and reorganized all the weird stuff in his childhood room twice, reorganized everything in the kitchen--and then put it all back when Henry got home from having lunch with a friend and yelled at him--and found enough masking tape and legal pads to re-write all the notes on the killings _again_ and put them up on one of the walls in the living room. He had to move a lot of pictures and knick knacks related to fishing to clear the wall space, but Henry for once seemed to realize that he was going to need to pick his battles carefully, and just told Shawn to leave the couch clear.

“Hey bud,” said Shawn absently and without looking away from his crime wall when Gus came in. He’d seen him through the window, and recognized his footsteps. “Did you get the crime scene photos from yesterday?”

“I made copies,” said Gus. He sounded weirdly subdued considering that he was one of the three other people in the world who knew that Shawn _wasn’t_ dead--they’d called Shawn’s mom, who was across the country, because Henry said otherwise she would end up seeing it in the paper.

“What was it like at the station?” said Shawn, taking the copies.

“What do you think, Shawn? People are sad,” said Henry from the couch, where he was watching TV, which was interesting because Shawn was pretty sure he’d been asking Gus.

“I’m _working_ the _case_ , Dad,” said Shawn. “Remember how all of the SBPD are also _suspects_?”

Gus glanced between them, and then said, “Mr. Spencer, could I talk to Shawn for a moment?”

Henry opened his mouth, probably to point out that it was _his_ living room--Shawn did know him pretty well, after all--and then took a good look at Gus, said, “I’m going to check on the garden,” got up, and left.

“What’s up?” said Shawn. Gus looked fairly serious still, so he closed the file folder with the crime scene photos and sat down with his friend on the couch. “Did something happen?”

“Nothing specific,” said Gus. “Your dad’s right, though, Shawn; people are sad.”

Shawn squirmed a little. “I mean, I’m not sorry if they’re sad about the _idea_ of me being dead, but I’m not doing this just to prove that people like me. I _am_ sorry that I’m making them think I’m actually dead. If there was another way, I’d do it.”

“I actually believe you,” said Gus, “even though, of everyone I know, you _are_ the most likely to fake your own death just to see who comes to your funeral--besides the whole serial killer angle. But don’t you think we could tell just a couple people? I feel really bad, Shawn.”

“Is it Jules? Is she all weepy?” said Shawn. “Aw, I didn’t mean to break her heart--”

Gus slapped his leg, which was probably slightly deserved. Just slightly. “Jules is sad but she’ll be OK,” he said. “Come on, Shawn, was that really ever going anywhere, all your flirting with Juliet?”

“Probably not,” admitted Shawn. “No one can say I didn’t try. I was very explicit about what I wanted to try. But she was never _quite_ on board.”

“Jules is nice, and she definitely likes you--maybe she even would have gone out with you someday--but I honestly think this whole thing might make her realize she’s really more interested in someone a little more...stable,” said Gus, shifting a little. Shawn grinned in realization.

“You sly dog, _you_ like her!” he said, swatting Gus’s leg back.

“Maybe, but I’m not going to ask her out while I lie to her about our mutual friend’s death,” said Gus. “Anyway, I’m more worried about Lassiter.”

“Weird,” said Shawn, sticking a finger in his ear. “You’re going to have to say that again, sounds like you said you’re worried about _Lassie_?”

“I’m not kidding,” said Gus. “I mean, those two are probably closest to you at the station, right? And I swear he looked worse than Jules today. He’s been, I don’t know, biting his nails and stuff. And he’s just really quiet; I mean, have you ever seen Lassie quiet?”

“He doesn’t talk just to make noise like I do, but...not often, and not for long,” admitted Shawn. If his flirting with Jules had been explicit and open, his flirting with Lassie had always been more under the radar. Well, OK, he outright called the man sexy and swatted his ass, but according to how Lassie always responded, this was just how bros behaved. If by “bros” you meant enemies who worked together a lot and were now grudging friends. Not that Shawn had ever considered Lassie an enemy, but it had taken a little while to break through. Anyway, the guy was going on a date with a different person every other week lately, it seemed like. Like he was looking for something. Or avoiding something. Or… “He’ll be fine,” said Shawn. “We’re planning the funeral for Saturday. That’s only three days away; he’ll make it til then.”


	3. Chapter 3

“Detective, you should leave,” said Chief Vick.

Carlton looked up in some confusion. It wasn’t particularly late. He was going over security footage from near the latest Astrology Murderer victim’s apartment, but so far the only vaguely interesting thing he’d seen was a cop car. “I’m fine,” he said, curling his right hand into a fist in his lap with his thumb inside. He’d actually only made it bleed once more during the day, though he’d accidentally taken off a little skin around his index fingernail, too. He’d finally grabbed a couple band-aids to try to break himself of the one-day habit.

“Carlton,” said the chief, more softly, “you look exhausted. You’ve been watching the same video for at least forty minutes.” There was no way that she’d been able to see his screen for that long, meaning someone must have told her; Carlton glared around at the others in the bullpen, wondering who’d snitched. No one met his eye. “O’Hara went home,” Chief Vick went on, “ten minutes ago, and I think it’s time you follow suit.”

He knew an argument wouldn’t do much good. “Fine,” said Carlton. He started shutting things down as she watched. Convinced, the chief headed back to her office, and Carlton finished turning things off and putting them away and headed out--and to the shooting range. There was no way he was going home yet.

At the range, as he automatically put on protective gear and started firing at his first target, Carlton suddenly remembered a story that his former partner had told about Spencer’s shooting abilities, way back on his first case with the department. Spencer had followed Lucinda down to the range, and apparently matched every single one of her shots. Carlton had never seen Spencer shoot, not at a range where he could really assess his accuracy. Now he never would.

The realization was unwelcome, as was, once again, the unnamed emotion that started to swell with it. Carlton growled at nothing and finished emptying his clip. He brought back the target, looked at it, sent it back, reloaded, and, on a whim, pulled out his earplugs. Then he started firing.

For a minute, when he was done, he was worried he’d made a really stupid mistake. His ears were ringing and his head was spinning and he couldn’t hear the rustle of paper as the target came back towards him. He could hardly hear his gun make contact with the little counter. He put his hands over his ears and rubbed them, stumbling a little where he stood--rubbed them until he realized that he could hear the sound of his hands brushing his ears perfectly well, and also the ringing was fading. Then he considered, and reloaded. One more time wouldn’t give him hearing loss. Not permanently.

***

“Good morning!” crowed Shawn when Gus stumbled downstairs in the morning. His friend had spent the night, sleeping in Shawn’s old room, which was perfect because Shawn had slept on the couch. For about an hour. Then he’d started going over the Astrology Murderer things again. “Gus, what does this symbol mean?”

“Did you sleep at all?” said Gus, rubbing his eyes and coming over to look at what Shawn had scrawled on yet another sheet of paper and taped to the wall under his notes on the fourth murder. “That’s the symbol for aquarius.”

“When is an aquarius person’s birthday?” said Shawn.

“January or February--I think it’s January 20th to February 19th,” said Gus, making his way to the kitchen. “Shawn, you made coffee and left _half a cup_ in the pot?”

“You’re welcome,” called Shawn, as Gus grumbled and started doing something--from the sounds, making more coffee. Apparently half a cup wasn’t enough. “Gus, come look at this.”

“I’d rather not,” said Gus, once he was back in the living room and Shawn was waving a crime scene photo in his face. “I haven’t even had breakfast yet.”

“Here, I’ll cover the bloody bits,” said Shawn, folding the paper in half. “I wanted you to see this shelf in Mary Martin’s living room.”

“What's on it? Looks like some cards,” said Gus, looking more closely.

“ _Birthday_ cards,” said Shawn, “look, that’s the same one with the tuna on it that I got Henry last year. Now, when _you_ get birthday cards, how long do you leave them up on a shelf or your fridge or wherever?”

“Not for seven or eight months,” said Gus slowly.

“Exactly,” said Shawn. He gestured at his fluttering wall of evidence again. “The fourth body had an aquarius symbol. Going based on everything we’ve seen, this victim should have been an aquarius. But unless she got those cards eight months ago, and _really_ liked them, she wasn’t. Which means that she was killed for some other reason. She must have known something about the Murderer.”

“But what did she know?” said Gus. “Forensics already went all over her house. Besides, _you_ can’t leave to go look at it.”

Shawn wasn’t about to sit around Henry’s house for another three--well, two now--days, but he didn’t say that; that was an argument for the future, preferably when it was too late for Gus to say no. “We can’t necessarily look at her stuff, or track her movements now, but I bet I know someone who was already tracking her movements, and who can tell us if she did anything weird in the last few days.”

***

“Hey, Detective Lassiter,” said McNab as soon as Carlton walked into the station in the morning, “Chief Vick wants to see you.”

Carlton blinked, went to put the files he’d brought home the night before down on his desk, then walked slowly to the chief’s office. Considering the last few times he’d been in there, he wasn’t sure he wanted to step through that door again. To his surprise, though, he wasn’t alone with the chief; O’Hara, looking like she’d slept terribly again, was there, along with a couple detectives Carlton recognized from the narcotics unit.

“Chief,” he said. “You wanted me?”

“Come in, Detective,” said Chief Vick. “We received a tip recently, which, put together with some of the good work narcotics has been doing, lets us know that there’s a large hand-off happening tonight at a warehouse down by the docks.”

Carlton waited for the connection to the Astrology Murderer. None came. “We’re going to have several units involved, but I thought you and Detective O’Hara would also be valuable to have on the scene. It’s a new, small gang providing the drugs--mostly cocaine--and we suspect that someone is going to try to double-cross them. Your experience and observation skills could be invaluable to keep this from getting messy.”

“I--thank you,” said Carlton. “But, Chief, O’Hara and I--we’ve _got_ a case.”

Chief Vick nodded to the two narcotics detectives, who nodded back and left the room. Carlton frowned after them. “Lassiter,” the chief said, “I know you and O’Hara split the Astrology Murderer files and brought them home last night. Did you discover anything new?”

Carlton looked at O’Hara, who shook her head slowly. “No, Chief,” said Carlton slowly. “Not yet.”

“Usually I would say we need to bring in Shawn, but…” said O’Hara, and then cut off, covered her mouth with her hand and turned away. To Carlton’s alarm, his own mouth started trembling slightly; he bit down hard on the inside of his lip and breathed through his nose until it stopped.

The chief was suspiciously quiet for a moment, too, but when she spoke her voice was brisk and steady. “Right, well, every killer makes a mistake eventually, but that mistake may not have happened yet in this case, and reading the same things over and over won’t help with finding one,” she said. “Meanwhile, you _are_ two of my best detectives, and I think your presence at this sting will be valuable; and also, I want you to go and focus on something different.”

“Yes, Chief,” said Carlton dully.

“Go find Detective Dobson, he’s got the relevant files to catch you up,” said Chief Vick, waving them out of her office. “And detectives--look after yourselves.”

Carlton frowned a little and said, “What? Why?”

O’Hara punched him lightly in the arm. “We will,” she promised.


	4. Chapter 4

Shawn waited until Gus was driving to show himself, which might not have been the best plan, safety-wise. “What--Shawn!” said Gus, narrowly avoiding hitting a parked car. “You were asleep in your room, your dad said so! Because you stayed up all night.”

“You know, I’m glad you bought the lie I told my dad, because it let me climb out of my window and hide in your back seat,” said Shawn, climbing into the front while Gus hissed at him to get down, “but I’m a little offended, Gus, do you really think I’d take a nap in the middle of a serial killer case?”

“Uh, yes,” said Gus, giving Shawn the shove he needed to land in the passenger seat. “Put on your seatbelt. Shawn, you stop working on murder cases when you hear the peanut guy.”

“Fair,” said Shawn, after consideration. “We’re going to Mary Martin’s neighbor, right?”

“ _I’m_ going there,” said Gus. “You shouldn’t even be out in public right now, I’ll drop you off back at your dad’s.”

“Gus, you can’t, I’ll go insane,” said Shawn. “Come on, I’ll stay in the car and everything.”

“No you won’t,” said Gus.

“No, I won’t,” agreed Shawn, “but we’ll be very careful. I’ll wear a disguise.”

“Where are you going to get a disguise?” said Gus.

“I could shred paper to make a wig,” suggested Shawn, opening the glove box and pulling out the pamphlet in there. “Hmm--you don’t need the manual for this car, do you?”

“ _Yes_ , I need the--it’s a _company car_ , Shawn!”

***

Carlton couldn’t find O’Hara. She’d gone to heat up her lunch in the microwave, and disappeared. They’d been going over files on the new, small drug-running gang together. He went asking around.

Lewis was coming back into the station from a lunch run, carrying a sandwich wrapped in paper stamped all over with a fancy “BF.” “Haven’t seen her,” he said, when Carlton asked him.

“She went towards the records room,” said McNab a minute later. Carlton frowned; they didn’t need anything from the records room. “I think she wanted--well, you’re her friend,” McNab went on, confusingly, “so I think she was looking for some privacy, but, um, it’s probably fine if you go find her.” He put a hand on Carlton’s shoulder before he walked away; Carlton looked after him, still frowning, then went to the records room.

O’Hara came out the door when he was almost to it, sniffling a little with her eyes red-rimmed. “Oh! Carlton--I’m sorry. I just needed a moment. I’ll come back as soon as I wash my face.” She scrubbed at her cheeks quickly with a tissue.

“It’s OK,” said Carlton. He wanted to say something about it being OK to show emotion and cry, but he knew how hypocritical it would be. Instead he paused for a moment, then opened his arms slightly.

O’Hara, luckily, understood the invitation. “Thanks,” she said, and hugged him. The front of his dress shirt started to feel damp where her face was. “The funeral’s Saturday, Gus texted me,” she said. “I just--I can focus on the job, mostly, and hold it all in until then, but sometimes it just--hits me, all at once.”

Carlton cleared his throat but didn’t say anything. He looked over O’Hara’s head at the records room door, and bit his lip again until he tasted blood, and did not cry.

***

“Hi, I’m Burton Guster,” said Gus, who had demanded the chance to do the introductions for once. “I’m a consultant for the SBPD. This is my friend, Dominick ‘Dance-off’ Dawson. He’s an exotic dancer, he’s visiting from out of town.”

“Why’s he got a grass skirt on his head?” said the young, pimply white guy who lived next door to Mary Martin and who had opened the door to Gus’s knock.

“I have a double hula performance next week,” said Shawn, shaking his head and making the grass skirt rustle--it was actually made of paper, and they’d bought it at a dollar store on the way there, along with the one he was wearing around his waist, over his jeans, and the terrible quality, oversized Hawaiian shirt he’d changed into. “It’s a type of hula where the skirts are double layered, top and bottom, very intricate, I’ve been wearing these everywhere I go for a month as part of my training.”

“Right,” said the guy slowly.

“Can we come inside?” said Gus.

Once they were all sitting in the cluttered living room, Gus asked about Mary Martin. “Oh, Mary,” said the guy--his name was Dane Butts, which was unfortunate for him. “She was my soulmate, you know. I mean, she said no when I asked her for a date, but it was only a matter of time. I just _knew_ it. I mean, we liked the same shows, and the same kinds of food--and every time she noticed me watching her, we made eye contact.”

It wasn’t easy to look meaningfully at Gus while wearing a grass skirt over his face, but when Dane started sniffling, Shawn managed it. They raised eyebrows at each other. What a creepy guy.

“Uh, how did you know you liked the same shows?” said Gus. Shawn didn’t need to ask; he’d already seen the faint marks on the wall behind Dane, which was the one next to Mary Martin’s apartment.

“Oh, I could hear her TV,” said Dane, “when I put a glass against the wall. We would watch _The Simpsons_ together.”

“And by ‘together,’ you mean…” said Shawn.

“Well, we were in our separate apartments, but whenever she’d turn it on, I’d go to the same channel,” said Dane. Shawn kind of wanted to keep exploring the stalkery depths that this guy had gone to in order to prove that Mary was his soulmate, but he also really didn’t.

“Before she was killed,” said Gus, “was there anything else unusual you noticed about Mary? Did she go anywhere or talk to anyone out of the ordinary?”

“Actually,” said Dane, “I think she’d seen something that worried her, something bad. She was talking to one of her friends on the phone the day before she died--asking what she should do if she’d seen something suspicious, but she had no proof. She wouldn’t give any specifics, though.”

“Incidentally, how long did _you_ know Mary?” said Shawn.

“Nine months, three weeks, and two days,” said Dane, “I moved in almost a year ago, we met a little after that.”

“And this phone call to her friend, it was recent?” said Gus.

“Last week,” said Dane. Shawn nodded--unless she’d suddenly developed X-ray vision, the suspicious thing that Mary had noticed was probably _not_ anything related to Dane’s shenanigans, since it sounded like he’d been stalkery for a while. “I could only hear her side of the conversation,” Dane went on, unashamed, “but I think her friend convinced her to go to the police, even though she seemed reluctant.”

Shawn and Gus both sat forward on their chairs. “Did she do it?” said Gus.

“I don’t know,” said Dane, “but she left right afterwards, and she was gone for almost an hour. The police station is a fifteen to twenty minute trip from here, depending on traffic, so that leaves about twenty minutes for her to have made some kind of statement at the station.”

Shawn never thought he’d be so thankful for someone this creepy. “Thanks, Dane,” said Gus as they got up, “this was helpful.”

“Did you say you work with the police? So shouldn’t there be a copy of her statement or something somewhere?” said Dane, looking anxious.

“There absolutely should,” said Gus, as Shawn exchanged another look with him through green paper strands. “We’ll go check that out.”

“A word of advice, Dane,” said Shawn, turning back when they were almost out the door, “Mary was...probably not your soulmate.”

“How can you know?” said Dane.

“Just a hunch,” said Shawn, forgoing the psychic act in case anyone asked around. “Buddy, the best way to get a woman--or a man--to notice you is usually _not_ to follow them creepily and memorize their every move. Sometimes friendship is all you get, and sometimes that’s OK! You just gotta accept it.”

Dane looked thoughtful, but not convinced. “You know,” said Shawn conversationally as he and Gus got back into the Blueberry, “after this whole thing is over, we should probably tip the police off about our friend in there. I feel like they’ll be encountering him again someday anyway, possibly when he’s on the receiving end of a restraining order.”

“You know that’s right,” said Gus.

***

It was getting dark outside the station. Carlton was on his way back towards the bullpen from the bathroom when a familiar but unexpected hand took his arm and pulled him into a mostly hidden corner. “Guster,” he said in surprise.

“Lassie,” said Guster, “listen, I--well, I’ve been looking into the Astrology Murderer case a little, ever since Shawn--since Shawn. And I was wondering--I know this seems odd, but I need to know if there were any tips or anything, people who came in with information on the Murderer in the last--say, two weeks.”

“There’s always tips called in, when there’s a serial killer,” said Carlton, pulling his arm back. Guster seemed surprisingly put-together for a man whose best friend had just died, considering he often cried just because someone else in the room was crying. Though he looked more serious than Carlton had ever seen him. “None of them have proven to hold water so far, though, just people trying to get on TV. I have to go, we’ve got a big drug bust tonight and we’re leaving in an hour.”

“Just a second,” pleaded Guster, grabbing his arm again. “You said ‘called in’--what about people actually coming into the station in person?”

Carlton frowned, thinking back. “No one’s come in in-person with a tip. I'm lead on this case, I would have been told.”

“One last thing,” said Guster, though he let his arm go; “are there security cameras, like at the front of the station? How could I get access to that footage?”

“You can’t,” said Carlton. “Not without the username and password of a sergeant or higher--or a detective. And access to our computers here.”

“Right,” said Guster. “You said you have a bust in an hour?”

“We’re all meeting in a conference room right now, to go over logistics one last time,” said Carlton. “I should go.”

“Of course,” said Guster, and took a step back. “Take care of yourself, Lassiter. And Jules. I mean, not that she needs protection, but--”

Carlton grabbed Guster’s arm suddenly. He had to ask. “How are you doing it?”

“What?” said Guster, looking oddly guilty.

“How are you so--OK,” said Carlton. “You’re working the case--Shawn died two days ago.”

Guster now looked compassionate, so much so that Carlton had to look away down the hallway rather than meet his eyes. “Shawn is--was my best friend,” he said. “And--I just _know_ he’d want me working on this for him. Helping close it. Besides, it’s--a distraction. Kind of.”

 _That_ , Carlton could understand. “OK,” he muttered, letting go of Guster’s arm. “Sorry. You can go.”

“Look after yourself,” said Guster again, and then he was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading and reacting, everyone! Hope you enjoyed the chapter! P.S. Dane is a creep, don't be like Dane.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: I did not tag this for suicidal ideation, because none of the characters is actively wishing they were dead or trying to make it happen. But Lassie has some thoughts about death in general, and also about whether it would really matter if he died on duty, so be aware of that as you go into this chapter.

“Shawn, I got it,” said Gus. Shawn waved lazily from where he was lying on the couch, watching _The Princess Bride_. Gus looked around, probably checking that Henry was gone--which he was, up in his bedroom--and added, “I also dropped by the Psych office to grab some snacks and your police scanner.”

“Thanks, buddy,” said Shawn.

“There wasn’t any report from a Mary Martin,” said Gus, “but I managed to download the security footage from the cameras in the station’s front hallway, and burn it onto this DVD; it wasn’t easy but since most of the bullpen was in a meeting for this big drug bust they have going on tonight, I used Juliet’s computer--she writes her passwords on a paper taped to the bottom of her one drawer--and--”

“Sounds like a spectacular story that deserves to be told in full,” said Shawn, “but we don’t have time for that right now, man, look, Inigo’s about to avenge his father. It’s late, we’re not going to be able to do anything tonight. We’ll watch the footage tomorrow.”

“True that,” said Gus, thankfully, dropping onto the couch by Shawn’s feet and dropping his armful of snacks, a DVD, and the police scanner on Shawn’s legs. Shawn _did_ want to solve the case--and to hear Gus’s story--but his sleepless night, plus a little of the stress of working to hide his identity and catch a serial killer, were actually catching up to him for once. Gus grabbed a packet of Red Vines and opened them, then offered the opening to Shawn.

“Thanks,” said Shawn, and took a couple. He frowned a little at something Gus had said, as Inigo chased Count Rugen through the castle. “Wait, are Lassie and Jules going on a drug bust tonight?”

“I guess so,” said Gus. “Does Westley look a little familiar to you?”

***

Carlton adjusted his bulletproof vest and made sure it was on securely, watching O’Hara do the same. Then they got out of the car and made their way through the ill-lit gravel lot to join some of the other officers who were filtering in slowly to form a perimeter around a particular warehouse.

“We’ve got a guy on the inside, been undercover for two months,” said one of the detectives from narcotics. Carlton hadn’t been able to remember their names--not that he’d tried very hard. “He’ll be able to get us a signal when the handoff is about to happen, which will be the best time to go in. Ideally, we bust in from several angles, yell and scare the hell out of them, no shots are even fired.”

“Ideally,” muttered Carlton skeptically. He and O’Hara drew their weapons and made their way around the building, and then carefully up a set of rickety stairs leading to the door to a second-floor catwalk. That was their entry point; since they couldn’t see the front, they would have to use synchronized watches and the sound of everyone else yelling to try to burst through the door at about the same time as the others, but the door was unlocked so they didn’t need to worry about breaking it down. O’Hara tried it gingerly, to make sure, and gave him a nod.

There followed twelve of the longest minutes of Carlton’s life. For some reason, as they waited, his mind went to Spencer. It could have been the potential shoot-out about to occur--at times like these, Carlton often had moments where he realized clearly that he could die on the job, although generally these just spurred him to even greater abilities. But it also could have been that, ever since the chief had pulled him and O’Hara into her office and told them Spencer was dead, Carlton had kept his mind as busy as possible. Even alone at his house, he’d brought home case files, or turned on _Cops_ to play in the background, or, ideally, left and gone to the station or the shooting range. Now it was silent and he was very alert to his surroundings, and that was all; and in the back of his mind, he thought _I could die right now in these next few minutes_ , and, _I wonder if Spencer knew it when he was about to die_.

O’Hara had one eye on her watch. “Now,” she mouthed, hand on the doorknob, and then there was the crash of a battering ram below them, and Carlton and O’Hara were through the door, yelling the same things as all of the other police flooding the place, variations on the theme of “Hands up! SBPD!”

At first, it all seemed to be going as well as possible. No one was on the catwalk with them; all of the gang members on the warehouse floor had their hands up, looking shocked. Then one of the people in the middle of the floor, who happened to have a handgun in one of his raised hands, yelled, “You sold us out!” and shot the guy next to him--who was _not_ the undercover police officer--in the head. After that, it was chaos.

Mostly it seemed like the gang members were turning on each other, which was better for the police, at least. Carlton swung his weapon back and forth, not sure who to point at. “Come on!” said O’Hara, going for the inside set of stairs, and racing down them. Already, the cops had gained the upper hand, but there were a few people still not surrendering, one of whom had his back to the foot of the stairs and was waving a handgun. O’Hara checked and slowed a little; he didn’t seem to hear them approaching.

There was a group of gang members rounded up and on their knees in the middle of the floor, with service weapons aimed at them. One of them looked up and at O’Hara right as she reached the ground. “Hey,” he yelled, “Mauricio, behind you!”

The guy at the foot of the stairs swung around and brought his gun up. Carlton didn’t even think, just moved. One second, he was still one stair up, staring at the guy’s gun as he turned; the next he was wrapped around O’Hara and lying on the ground, gasping fruitlessly for air.

O’Hara pushed him off and rolled him onto his back; behind her, dimly, he saw that someone had shot Mauricio in the shoulder, and he had dropped his weapon and was surrendering with the rest. Mostly, he saw O’Hara’s concerned face, her hair escaping her bun and hanging down around it. “Carlton! Carlton, are you hit? Where’d it get you?”

He opened and closed his mouth, and finally managed to gasp out, “Vest.” All the air had been knocked out of him by the combined impacts of ground and bullet, but now breathing was getting a little easier again. Unfortunately, with breathing came pain. His entire left side, from his shoulder, which had hit the ground first, to his ribs, which had taken a bullet at close range, even if the vest had blocked it, throbbed in time with his heartbeat.

“Carlton,” said O’Hara, now sounding pissed as well as concerned. “I had a vest on, too, you know.” He held up his hand--his right one--and she hauled him up and supported him in a sitting position. “I would have been--you didn’t have to--why did you do that?”

Carlton shook his head wordlessly, grimacing a little at the continued throbbing. It didn’t feel like he had any serious injuries, though, beyond what would surely be some spectacular bruises. “Carlton,” said O’Hara again, “I’m worried about you. I’ve been worried.” Around them, someone yelled orders, and gang members were cuffed and led away to a paddy wagon. “Ever since Shawn--”

“I can’t,” said Carlton, hoarsely, cutting her off. “I can’t lose you too.”

“Oh, Carlton,” said O’Hara. She knew as well as he did what getting shot in the vest felt like, so she was gentle as she knelt on his right side and wrapped her arms around his neck in a hug. Carlton brought up his right arm and patted her on the back awkwardly, his head sideways against her own vest. She might have been crying a little into his hair. Carlton stared at the foot of the stairs, dry-eyed, without seeing them. It was true that he wouldn’t have been able to handle it if O’Hara had been shot, but that wasn’t really what he’d been thinking as he dove to cover her. Mostly he’d been thinking that, if _he_ was shot, it wouldn’t really matter.

***

The police scanner crackled quietly to life. Shawn woke up and picked it up from where it was wedged next his head, then glanced at Gus. He’d turned the scanner on low right before they’d fallen asleep at opposite ends of the couch; Gus was still asleep, the lights from the DVD menu screen playing on his face. Shawn got up carefully and took the scanner into the kitchen.

Shawn was pretty sure he knew the address where the drug bust was going down, and now that address was being reeled out over the police scanner, along with the phrase “shots fired.” This alone wasn’t inherently worrying; after all, it was probably Lassie who’d been first to fire his gun. It didn’t mean anyone was _hit_.

A few minutes later, he caught a bit about a bus being en route. Shawn hopped up onto the counter and put the scanner on his lap, curling over it. It sounded like it was a gang member who’d been shot. So that was OK.

“Possible 10-53--we may have an officer down,” squawked the scanner, and then the person rattled off Lassie’s badge number. Shawn felt his entire body tense up, to the point that he almost fell off the counter. This couldn’t be real. Lassie couldn’t be _down_ \--not actually down. It was Lassie. He was tough. He was...sad, according to Gus. He was still under the impression that Shawn was dead.

“Disregard that,” said a different voice, after identifying itself. “Officer was hit in the vest. No additional bus needed.”

Shawn relaxed, and actually _did_ slide off the counter at that, ending up sitting hunched over on the floor with the scanner still in his lap. Lassie was OK. Probably pretty bruised, if he’d been shot in the vest, but OK. He stared at the police scanner, only half hearing it, and considered. That had been possibly one of the most terrifying moments of Shawn’s life, and he’d been in denial for most of it. Meanwhile, he had everyone at the station thinking he was actually and legitimately dead.

He spent a minute trying to feel bad for _everyone_ , but his mind kept coming back to Lassie. Jules, as Gus had told him, was pretty tough. She would be OK. Chief Vick, even Buzz--they were sad, sure, but also mature and functional people who didn’t, like, rely on him or anything. Lassie was tough, too, but Shawn thought back to his separation and divorce, and was suddenly pretty sure that Lassie didn’t do well with people leaving him. Shawn felt his heartbeat calm down gradually, and kept looking at the scanner, and realized that more than anything else--more than popping up at his own funeral and telling everyone he was fine, or finding Jules, picking her up, and spinning her around to show he was alive--he wanted to go to wherever Lassie was right now, probably bruised and battered, and hug him. Just hug him. He sighed, clicked off the scanner, and checked his watch. Well after midnight--technically, only one more day until the funeral.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen I don't really know how police scanners would work, but honestly, every cop show probably also gets it wrong a little. In case you're curious, the research I did suggests that 10-53 is actually the code for "person down," not "officer down," but as far as I can tell the code for officer down would also require all available units to respond, and the whole point of this sting is that there's already a bunch of people there anyway. Sorry if I just ruined your suspension of disbelief with this too-detailed note!


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: (mild?) self-harm. If you want to read on without further spoilers, go for it. If you want specifics about what I'm considering self-harm, and where it is in the chapter, skip to the end note.

“Pause it,” said Shawn, shoving another spoonful of cereal into his mouth. He set the bowl on the coffee table, narrowly avoiding slopping milk over the sides--Henry looked at it sharply--and grabbed the remote from Gus. “There she is.”

All three of them had been watching the security footage from the day that Mary Martin had apparently gone to talk to the police about something suspicious that no one had written down or recorded anywhere. Gus had gotten footage from the cameras right inside the front entrance, aimed at the hallway; there was no guarantee that they’d know who Mary had talked to, but they would at least be able to see whether or not she’d come into the station. And now they knew.

“That _is_ her,” said Gus, leaning forward. “OK, where does she go next?”

Shawn pressed play. Mary Martin made her way into the station, but before she could even get to the front desk, she was approached by a uniformed officer. They talked for a minute, and then he led her away--in a direction that suggested the basement, and the interrogation rooms. “You said she had a tip, something suspicious?” said Henry. “That guy should have had her sit on the bench and maybe fill out a form. _Maybe_ bring her further into the station, but he wouldn’t need to take her to interrogation if she’s just bringing in a tip.”

“The interrogation rooms are way more private, though,” said Shawn. He rewound as they walked out of shot. Foreshortened and from above, the uniformed officers all looked pretty similar--except for Buzz, who was still somehow obviously Buzz. “Who was it?”

The people on the screen speed-walked backwards. Mary and the unknown officer backed into the shot, then split apart. Shawn pressed play. They came together. Mary looked around, almost as though she wanted someone else to help her instead. There was something familiar about the officer’s walk, but Shawn was familiar with pretty much everyone in the SBPD. As they walked offscreen, though, there was a flicker, and Shawn paused and rewound again. This time he pressed play, and then pause immediately after it, and was able to catch the officer’s face as he glanced up and directly at the security camera. “Officer Lewis!” said Gus.

“I don’t recognize him,” said Henry, frowning.

“He’s pretty new,” said Shawn, “just transferred here in the last...two months or so…” He trailed off. The first murder had been six weeks ago.

“Oh, my God,” said Gus, jumping up and going over to Shawn’s wall of notes. “Mary Martin worked at the Bouquet of Flours--that’s just a couple blocks away from the station.”

“Lewis always gets lunch there!” said Shawn, thinking of the sandwich wrappings he’d seen in the guy’s trash can, as he joined Gus and looked at the wall. “She must have seen something weird--look,” he added, pointing to the notes for victim number four, a guy, “he worked pretty near the station, and _really_ near the bakery, I wonder if Lewis first saw him there and Mary noticed something off about their interaction, something suspicious but not provable.”

“And then got spooked when he ended up dead,” said Gus. “Shawn, we know who it is, we can go tell Lassie and Juliet now!”

“We don’t have any evidence,” said Shawn, his shoulders slumping a little. “He’s made damn sure of that. I’ll bet he’s even got alibis for the nights of the murders.”

They went back and sat on the couch again, more subdued. “I don’t understand how he chose the rest of his victims,” said Gus, gesturing at the wall where the five victims did indeed span a range of genders--well, two--and ages and occupations.

“He’s crazy,” said Henry shortly, grabbing the remote and ejecting the security footage DVD. “He’s probably got a system, something to do with the astrology stuff, but it’ll only make sense to him. I’ve seen this kind of thing before. He’s also good at not getting caught. I think you’re right, Shawn, that he’ll come to your funeral--and if you pull the reveal right, he’ll try to kill you, and end up revealing himself. But we need to drill this plan perfectly. If we mess up, and he gets away, he’ll come after you for real.”

***

Carlton sat at his desk and typed away at his report. He couldn’t even feel the bruises unless he moved his arm. Or his torso. OK, or any of the rest of his body, really. Typing didn’t hurt, though. When they’d arrived at the station after the sting the night before, the chief had strongly suggested that he not come into work that Friday, or at least not that morning; and Carlton had nodded solemnly, gone home, slept for two or three hours, woke up, remembered Shawn Spencer was dead, and come into work early. It was turning into his new routine.

“Oh--hey, Gus,” said O’Hara, nearby, and Carlton looked up.

“Hi, guys,” said Guster, plopping a large cardboard take-out box on Carlton’s desk. “I don’t know if you had lunch yet, but I brought some sandwiches in. There’s extras,” he added as a few nearby officers perked up at the mention of free food, “any of you could have one, too--Lewis? Oh, you always go to that same bakery for lunch, don’t you?”

Lewis nodded and smiled and waved the sandwich he was already eating. Carlton peered into the box of wrapped sandwiches, and took one out. He put it in front of himself, but didn’t unwrap it.

“How have you been doing?” said O’Hara, taking her own sandwich. “I’m sure it’s--well, I guess I don’t really know what it’s been like for you.”

“I’m managing,” said Guster. “I mostly came to talk to the chief, and kind of spread it around--you all know Shawn’s funeral is tomorrow, right? We were able to plan it pretty quickly. The whole station is invited, of course.”

When Guster said, “Shawn’s funeral,” Carlton turned his head away, quickly enough that the motion jarred his left shoulder, making the bruises ache. He inhaled quietly at the pain, looked back at Guster, and then realized that for a moment, the pain had been _all_ he felt or was focused on. “We’ve rented a tent in case it rains,” said Guster, still talking about the funeral, and Carlton reached for the sandwich jerkily with his left hand, and hissed slightly through his teeth as his shoulder protested. O’Hara shot him a concerned look.

“I’m going to talk to Chief Vick, hopefully she’ll make some sort of announcement,” said Guster. “But I wanted to tell you two specifically, too. I know Shawn would--I know Shawn would want you there.”

Guster’s voice hitched. Carlton surreptitiously moved his left elbow out from his side a little and then slammed it into his ribs. Hopefully the resulting grimace looked a little like a sympathetic smile. O’Hara spoke up for both of them. “We’ll be there, Gus. Let us know if there’s anything we can do to help.”

***

“What do _you_ think the color scheme should be?” Shawn greeted Gus when he walked back into Henry’s house, as the light outside was beginning to fade.

“I think black is pretty much the accepted funeral color scheme, Shawn,” said Gus.

Henry shot Gus a “help me” look, which Shawn saw out of the corner of his eye. “I saw that, Dad,” he said calmly, poring over his diagram of the set up. “Gus, tell Dad he should spring for the platinum-lined coffin. We can reuse it!”

“Shawn, I am buying the cheapest coffin I can buy without it looking like I don’t love you,” said Henry, turning the page of his coffin catalogue. “And we’re returning it when all of this is over.”

“Bet _that_ doesn’t happen very often,” said Shawn. “Did you ask them about their return policy?” He’d been examining the seating chart since Gus walked in, but now he looked up and saw Gus looking kind of depressed, still standing near the door. Usually _Shawn_ was the one who got depressed at funerals. “Come on, buddy,” he said. “It’s not every day you get to plan your best friend’s funeral without the friend actually being dead. Come help me pick out some flowers.”

“Sorry if I’m not all happy and cheery,” said Gus snippily, though he did come across the room and sit by Shawn on the couch. “I just spent an hour talking to our friends--who are all convinced you're actually dead--about the funeral and also how much we all miss you.”

“Aw,” started Shawn flippantly, and then Henry and Gus gave him the same sort of look, and he sighed and pushed his diagrams away, and looked back at them. “Look, I know this is all depressing and angsty, OK? And I know I get to hide away here while you’re out dealing with people grieving me, and I know people are genuinely sad. But, you know, I’m _not_ actually dead, so that’s a plus. And I’m not going to make it any better by sitting here feeling bad for myself, or anyone else! So if you’ll pardon me, I’m going to work out how best to impress people, reassure them, and catch a serial killer all in the course of about five minutes.”

Henry put up his hands but didn’t argue. Gus picked up a catalogue of flowers and said, “Where’d you even get all these?”

“Funeral home,” grunted Henry. “They weren’t impressed at the lack of body.”

They paged through things in silence. Shawn scribbled over one of his diagrams. “How’d Lassie look?” he asked quietly after a little while.

“OK, I guess,” said Gus. Shawn had told Gus about what he’d heard on the police scanner--though not what he’d felt about it--when Gus had woken up that morning. “He might have been favoring his left side a little. But he’s--” he cut off for a moment, and Shawn glanced at him. Gus looked back steadily. “I talked to Juliet for a minute, without him there, and she’s worried about him, Shawn. He’s bottling everything up, of course, because it’s Lassiter. But he’s, like, bottling up more than just grief or whatever--he’s almost emotionless.”

“That’s just Lassie,” scoffed Shawn, “he doesn’t _show emotion_.” Even as he said it, examples of Lassie showing emotion flooded through his mind--Lassie smiling, occasionally laughing, looking concerned, saying “nice work, Spencer” even though he sounded grudging while he did. Lassie drunk and depressed; Lassie worried. He’d seen them all. “The funeral’s tomorrow,” he said sharply, even though the only person he was cutting off was his own brain, which probably didn’t count as a separate person. “After that, it’ll all be back to normal.”

“I doubt it,” muttered Henry. Shawn chose to ignore him.

***

Carlton lay on the couch, on his right side, and used his remote to flip through things he’d TiVo’d. He’d come home at a reasonable time for once--well, semi-reasonable, he’d eaten dinner at the station--and he really _was_ tired, but his brain wouldn’t turn off enough for him to fall asleep. He put on some recorded episodes of _Cops_ he’d seen already, and drifted.

On the screen, some bad guys on motorcycles revved their engines and started to try to get away, and Carlton had a sudden image--entirely fictional and in his head, but vivid nonetheless--of Spencer on his motorcycle, coming around a blind turn and meeting a truck head on. The Spencer in his head swerved and flipped off of his bike; Carlton shook his head to get rid of the image, and accidentally flipped off his couch. It wasn’t really a flip as much as it was a roll; he hit the ground left side first and then lay there gasping and waiting for his head to clear. As soon as the pain faded, though, he thought of Spencer’s face, and his usual range of expressions--had he been scared? Nervous? Excited? He was always-- _had_ been always--a bit of an adrenaline junkie. Carlton gritted his teeth and rolled so that the leg of the couch pressed into his side, right where the bullet had hit his vest.

It was a vicious cycle. Even when he switched from _Cops_ to a channel playing the weather, every time Carlton let the pain in his bruises die down, he would think of Spencer. He even pulled out his phone and scrolled to Spencer’s contact, still lying on the floor, but didn’t press “call.” He knew he could, and that it would be Spencer’s inane voicemail message, and he also knew that if he did that and heard his voice, he would _actually_ break down. The stand holding his TV and hi-fi had nice sharp corners. Carlton didn’t bother to get up; he crawled across the floor and curled around one of the corners, pressing it into his left side. He could feel sweat springing up on the back of his neck and on his sides, and he could hear his breath, which was harsh and panting, and he could feel the dull throb of the abused bruises protesting. Carlton lay on the floor and held his phone tightly in his sweating hand, and did not cry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More specific CW: After the first *** (during the first section from Carlton's POV), Carlton jostles his already-present bruises on purpose to distract himself. After the third *** (the last section, and the second one from Carlton's POV) he again presses on his bruises, more severely, to use the pain as a distraction.
> 
> Two other little things: I'm realizing it might make more sense for only IA to have access to police station security footage? But that's the beauty of fiction. Also, Henry describes the bad guy as "crazy" but although the idea is in fact that he's probably mentally unstable, I don't want to suggest that people society sees as "crazy" are all serial killers or something. Usually they just need some support. And for you to _not_ call the police on them if they're having a crisis.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: self-harm (different than last chapter). For a more specific (but still detached) description, go to the end notes; otherwise, read on.
> 
> Also, thanks to you all for reading so far! This is probably the most followed multi-chapter thing I've ever posted (to be fair, there are like 3 or 4 total) so I really appreciate it.

The day of Shawn Spencer’s funeral dawned cloudy, but not raining. “ _I_ don’t really need to wear black, do I?” said Shawn. “What?” he went on when Gus just gave him a look and told him to go get dressed. “Serious question! I’ve never thought about what to wear to my own funeral before!”

At the cemetery, Shawn hid in the back of Gus’s car until Gus gave him the all clear. “Come on,” said Gus once he got out, “be quick, if someone sees you now, we’re screwed.”

“I just want to see the entrance,” said Shawn, dragging against Gus’s grip on his arm. The tent was really more of an open sided pavilion, with an aisle, and tasteful folding chairs on either side. Up at the front was a small portable stage, with Shawn’s coffin on it--closed, of course. Here at the entrance were some flowers, and--“Is that the painting of me from the Monarch Lodge?” said Shawn. “Aw, man, I told you to use the promo photos of me as Chad!”

“Come _on_ , Shawn,” hissed Gus, and dragged him away. “No one wanted to see you as Chad at your funeral.”

“I bet you would have had _more_ attendees,” said Shawn. “I’ve got fans. Also, Gus, we have hours until the funeral, it’s practically still dark, no one is showing up this early no matter how much they love me.”

“It’s not _still dark_ , it’s eight-thirty in the morning,” said Gus. “And it doesn’t matter how long we have, I won’t be happy till you’re underground.” They stopped and looked at each other. “Under the stage,” Gus corrected. “I don’t really want, uh--”

“I know what you meant,” said Shawn, taking pity on him. “Let’s see what we can do.”

The portable stage had a little space under it, though an annoying amount of it was taken up with supports. Gus lifted the fabric around it at the back, and Shawn squirmed in. “No trapdoor to pop out of?” he said. “Oh, well. There goes that part of the plan. I wish Dad had let me hide in the casket.” Henry was serious about returning the casket, meaning that he didn’t want to risk it getting damaged or dirty. Also he’d said something about Shawn giving people heart attacks if he climbed out from his own casket, but Shawn had stopped listening at that point.

“You remember the prompt, right?” muttered Gus, crouching at the edge of the stage.

“Before the eulogies,” said Shawn obediently. “Not that I’d mind hearing what you’ve written.”

“I haven’t written anything, Shawn, you aren’t actually dead yet,” said Gus, “and I don’t write out all of my speeches ahead of time, unlike you.”

“Shame,” said Shawn. “Yes, I’ll come out at the right time, though. Um, out from here, I mean--”

“I already know you’re bi, Shawn,” said Gus. “You came out to me in eighth grade. Besides, I’ve seen how you look at Lassiter.”

“Yeah,” said Shawn. It didn’t feel like the time for a joke. “Hey--I really do want this to work, you know. I don’t want to put you--or anyone--through this again any time soon.”

“I know,” said Gus. He reached in a fist--Shawn reached back and bumped it, and then Gus let the fabric fall back into place and Shawn was alone under the stage.

***

When Carlton and O’Hara walked up to the edge of the tent, and Carlton saw the stupid painting of Spencer from the Monarch Lodge, and then he looked past it and saw the shiny black closed casket sitting on the stage next to the podium, he suddenly knew he couldn’t do it. “I’ll--I’ll be right back,” he said to O’Hara, who was trying to hand him a program.

“Carlton,” she said, but he was already stumbling towards the parking lot.

The entrance to the cemetery had brick pillars supporting an open gate. Carlton stopped and caught himself against one of them. One of the mourners going past gave him an odd look, but didn’t say anything. Carlton watched him go; he headed towards the pavilion where Shawn’s funeral was. Carlton was sure he’d never seen the man before in his life.

That was the thing about Shawn--he had _so many friends_. So many people knew him, and liked him, and once upon a time Carlton would have been lost as to why, but somehow, in the years he’d known him, he’d become one of those people to know and like Shawn, too. And Shawn liked him back--Carlton knew he had. He didn’t know exactly why or in what way; Shawn flirted with most things that moved, and he’d never been sure if Shawn was flirting with him seriously, or if it was just another thing he did with his friends. But they’d at least _been_ friends, and Carlton had always thought that maybe--someday--now that Carlton was divorced--and if Shawn and O’Hara didn’t--and maybe--someday--and now Shawn was dead.

Carlton snarled, and grabbed at his left shoulder, but the bruises had mostly faded to a dull ache overnight. So instead he cocked his right fist, and slammed it into the brick pillar.

The pain cleared his head, and the angry motion felt good, but it wasn’t enough. Shawn was still dead and his body was still in that casket and Carlton rested his forehead on the rough brick for a moment, then pushed off and out through the gates, looking around for his car. Most of the people who were going to arrive were already there at the cemetery, walking towards the pavilion, so there was no one to see him as he made his way over to his Crown Vic. No one watched as Carlton stood at his car door and made a fist, and looked at the already slightly broken skin over his knuckles. No one said anything as he unlocked the car and opened the door. No one stopped him when he closed his hand around the side of his car, so that his fingers were inside; and no one, not even Carlton, yelled when he slammed the car door closed on his hand.

It hurt more than Carlton had expected. The door didn’t actually latch; he pulled his hand away, and closed the door for real, and then slid down and sat on the ground and examined his hand. It was bleeding sluggishly from a few spots, and three of his fingers were a weird shape. Carlton found he could only think about one thing at a time, which was what he’d been going for, but it made deciding what to do difficult. He needed to go back to the funeral, he thought, because O’Hara was worried about him. He stood up, and then realized he needed to hide his hand from her. He used his left hand to open the flap of his jacket pocket, and to help ease his right hand inside.

“Are you OK?” whispered O’Hara when he found her along the edge of the tent and slid into the outside seat she’d saved.

“Fine,” whispered Carlton back, as sitting jostled his hand and he felt sweat prickling at his temples and in the hollow of his throat. She handed him a program; he took it left-handed and then, reluctantly, looked up at the stage, where Henry Spencer was coming up to the podium.

***

Shawn had convinced Gus and his dad to plan for at least a few minutes of funerary content, so that any stragglers had time to arrive. When they’d been planning, he’d half expected to enjoy it, but the space under the stage was cramped and impossible to move around in, and suddenly, knowing that everyone was out there, but _not_ going out to see them and reassure them and make it OK, was almost intolerable. He sighed, rested his forehead on his folded arms, and listened.

Henry thanked everyone for coming, sounding solemn. Shawn frowned at the ground without really being able to see it. Apparently since he was starting to feel guilty about fooling everyone attending his funeral, his brain or conscience or whatever was going to make him feel guilty for everything he’d had Gus and Henry do over the past five days, too. At least this ruse had meant his life was actually slightly _less_ in danger than it would have been otherwise; they’d have been stressed out either way.

After Henry’s welcome, they played some recorded classical song that Gus had picked. Henry had refused to hire a string quartet, and Shawn hadn’t pushed for it that hard. Those were more for weddings, anyway. Then Gus got up and said that there would be a few words, but first, they needed a moment of silence. That was Shawn’s cue, and also meant that Lewis was in the tent--otherwise, Gus would have stalled.

Shawn never got nervous for big performances. He sought them out. So he wasn’t quite sure what the odd feeling was that started in his stomach and crawled up his throat as he pushed the fabric aside and squirmed out behind the stage, where no one could see him. He ignored it as he brushed himself off, stood up, and stepped up behind his own casket.

Several people gasped. At least one screamed, which was a little satisfying. There were more people than Shawn had expected, which was flattering and also made him feel even more guilty. “Hello, ladies and gentlemen,” he said, going over to the podium and leaning towards the microphone. “As you can see, rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”

More people made shocked noises; Shawn glanced around the audience during a dramatic pause and saw Jules and Lassie, both looking slightly stunned, and then turned and found Lewis. He looked shocked, too, and also furious. Good start. “I apologize deeply to those of you I’ve hurt--really, I’m sorry,” said Shawn. “But it was a necessary ruse. You see, the Astrology Murderer had me in his sights. I was supposed to be the next victim, based on, well, the note that said I was next. The police were willing to offer me protection, of course, but there was just one problem.” He jumped down off of the stage, which hadn’t been a part of the plan he’d discussed with Gus or Henry, but his sense of the dramatic was taking over. “My psychic senses were tingling. The police wouldn’t have been protection enough--in fact, they wouldn’t have been protection at _all_ , because the Astrology Murderer is a member of the police force!” There were more gasps. Good; he was doing it up right.

“Now, at the time of the threat, I didn’t know _which_ member of the SBPD could have been doing this,” said Shawn, making his way down the aisle. “So the only thing to do was fake my own death, to make the entire force think I was out of the way.” He looked up and to the right, and caught’ Jules’s eye, where she was sitting next to Lassie near the outside of the pavilion. Hopefully she read the “sorry” in his expression. Lassie was kind of blinking at nothing, and Shawn couldn’t quite make eye contact with him.

“My time pretending to be dead brought me into closer communion with the spirits,” Shawn went on, stalking closer to where Lewis was sitting. “They revealed to me the person who committed those murders, who had it out for me, and who has been getting away with everything so far.” He stopped and stared directly at Officer Lewis, who stared back, murderously. So far, so good. “Officer Lewis!” he yelled dramatically, swinging his entire arm around to point as though it was being directed by an outside force. “You arrived in Santa Barbara two months ago, and the killings started just a couple weeks later. The spirits don’t know why or how you chose your first victims; only you know that. But your fifth victim, well, she wasn’t part of your weird little astrology-based plan. No, Mary Martin was a threat. She worked at the bakery you always visit; she saw something suspicious when you talked to your fourth victim, and when he turned up dead, she went to the police station to tell someone. Unfortunately for her, you were the person who took her statement.”

He had more, mostly little details and carefully thought out taunts designed to provoke the killer, but Lewis jumped up before Shawn could go on. “You’re a fake!” he yelled, pointing at Shawn. “You don’t talk to spirits, you don’t know the first thing about being psychic. You make the police look like fools, and you dirty the name of those of us who _really_ hear the spirits’ voices.”

“Uh, whatever voices you hear are probably _not_ spirits,” said Shawn.

“I should have killed you first!” yelled Lewis, which sounded nicely confessional and all, only then he pulled out his service weapon.

Luckily he was surrounded by other cops, a few of whom had also apparently come armed to a funeral. There was a brief struggle and some yelling, and then Lewis was on the ground and handcuffed, in a circle of knocked over folding chairs. Shawn looked around, saw people gaping at him and starting to come towards him, and turned and ran back to the podium.

“Hey!” he said breathlessly into the mic when he was back on the stage. “So, I really appreciate you all coming out to…” He stopped and took a breath. “OK, listen. I am _really really_ sorry I made you all think I was dead. I will try to make it up to all of you. Um, but there’s one of me and a lot of you so, feel free to hang out and enjoy the...macaw surroundings--”

“Macabre,” called Gus from the front row.

“Those too, or you can head out now and enjoy the rest of your suddenly free morning,” said Shawn. “I’ll come around and talk to you if you stay. I just can’t talk to everyone at once. But I’ll make the rounds, I promise.” He looked up as he promised, and finally, finally made eye contact with Lassie. “That’s all, thanks,” he said inanely, and jumped down off the stage again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More specific CW: After the first *** (the middle section, and the only one from Carlton's POV), Carlton punches a brick pillar, is not distracted enough, and so goes and slams his hand in his car door and breaks a few fingers.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No specific content warning; however! the damage that Lassie did in past chapters is still there. And everyone is not all happy yet, it will take time (which is why there are two(!) more chapters after this one, instead of the one I originally outlined for). So, you know, prepare for even more emotions.

Carlton had something stuck in his throat. He wasn’t sure how, because the only thing he’d had that day so far was coffee, but he could _feel_ something there, and besides, that was the best explanation for why he couldn’t talk and was having trouble breathing normally. Next to him, O’Hara was crying openly as Shawn hopped down from the stage a second time, right after looking directly at Carlton. “That _idiot_ ,” she said fiercely with tears on her cheeks. “I can’t believe it _worked_. Oh, my God, Gus must have known the whole time.”

Shawn had clapped Guster on the back, and was now making his way down the aisle and through the crowd, shaking hands and accepting hugs but also making steady forward progress. Carlton realized he was headed towards _them_. He and O’Hara were still standing--they’d stood when Lewis drew his weapon--and now Carlton took a step away from her, towards the outside border of the pavilion, and watched Shawn approach.

In another minute--or maybe ten seconds, possibly half an hour--Shawn was there, with his arms around O’Hara. “Jules--ow--I am _so sorry_ ,” he said, as she punched him in the ribs and then hugged him back. “Gus kept telling me to tell you guys, but--I mean, I trusted you, and the chief, but I didn’t trust _anyone else_ in the station, and I couldn’t risk anyone finding out. I had to keep it locked down tight.”

Carlton stared at Shawn, taking him in. His hair was almost as styled as normal, though slightly mussed from wherever he’d been hiding. He had on a plaid shirt and jeans. His voice rose and fell in the same familiar cadences; and then he looked up and at Carlton, with a rare but familiar concerned expression, his eyebrows lowered over his eyes--what color were they, brownish? Greenish? Carlton felt his own eyes fill up, with some alarm.

He hadn’t cried yet. He’d _grieved_ , he’d spent the past five days in his own weird form of grieving, but Carlton hadn’t yet actually _cried_ about Shawn being dead because he’d managed to stop himself every time. Now Shawn _wasn’t_ dead, and Carlton shook his head without knowing why, and did his best to clench his right hand into a fist, where it was still shoved into his pocket.

Moving his hand hurt a lot, which was the goal--it almost made him throw up, which was _not_ the goal--but the emotions kept coming, too. “Lassie,” said Shawn, letting go of O’Hara and taking a step towards him, and Carlton took in a breath that sounded an awful lot like a sob, and turned and left the tent.

He tried to run, aware that it was probably more of a stumble, but Carlton must have made fairly good time because he was suddenly standing on the sidewalk outside the cemetery gates without anyone having stopped him. His legs didn’t let him go any farther. He staggered and went to his knees, pulling out his right hand to help catch himself and then remembering and just curling over it instead. Everything around him felt very far away. There was the sidewalk, and cars, and maybe people, but mostly there was just his hand, which hurt, and his feelings, which also hurt, and his cheeks, which were wet, and his breath, which was tearing out of him in bursts and shaking his whole body. Then, suddenly, there was another body entering his awareness, pressing warm along his back; there were arms that came around his own upper arms and chest and held him, tightly, and there was Shawn’s voice in his ear saying, “Lassie, Lassie, Carlton, I’m here.”

***

Lassie did look pretty bad; Gus had not been kidding. Shawn made a beeline for him--and Jules--once he hopped down from the stage, and saw that he was pale, and kind of staring, and that he had his right hand shoved into his jacket pocket at a weird angle. And then when Shawn let go of Jules and took a step towards him, he turned and basically ran away, which was also weird. Shawn stared after him. So, maybe Lassie wasn’t big on hugs--Shawn wouldn’t have had to actually _hug_ him, even though he wanted to. He could have just...patted his shoulder or something.

“Go after him,” said Jules, wiping her eyes and giving Shawn a not-so-gentle shove. “He’s been really--really _something_ ever since you, well, didn’t actually die, I guess. He needs you.”

Shawn gave her a wild look, because that was a lot of pressure--and probably an exaggeration, Lassie didn’t really _need_ him, right?--and then went after him.

He made it to the cemetery gates in time to see Lassie’s legs kind of fold up and deposit him on the sidewalk. Without any conscious input from his mind, Shawn’s body took two steps forward, went down on its knees, and wrapped its arms around the tangled huddle of limbs that was Lassie. Lassie’s back heaved against Shawn’s chest, and he realized that Lassie was sobbing so hard that his whole body was shaking. Shawn’s mouth started saying soothing things, again without conscious input. Shawn’s consciousness was mostly in the back of his mind, quietly panicking. This was not how it was supposed to happen! Once Shawn popped up, everyone was supposed to be startled, maybe cry a _little_ , and then rejoice that he was alive. Not break down on the sidewalk so hard that Shawn was pretty sure there were both tears and snot dripping onto his forearms where they were locked around Lassie’s chest.

“Lassie,” he said again, wrenching his higher brain functions back to the situation at hand. He shifted and peeked over Lassie’s shoulder, mostly to see if it actually _was_ snot, and saw Lassie’s right hand sitting in his lap. It was kind of covered in blood, but Shawn could see enough to tell that some of his fingers were at angles that fingers weren’t really supposed to be at. “Woah,” he said, unwrapping himself and moving around Lassie until he could take his shoulders, gently, and uncurl him a little. “Lassie, what’d you do to your hand?”

Lassie shook his head and held up his right hand, looking at it almost as if he hadn’t noticed the damage. Then he held up his left hand, and took hold of the front of Shawn’s shirt, and shook his head again, tugging on it. “OK,” said Shawn, “OK.” He shuffled closer on the sidewalk, mindful of Lassie’s right hand, which must have hurt like a bitch, and wrapped his arms around Lassie’s shoulders again, from the front this time. Lassie clung to his shirt one-handed and got more snot on Shawn’s collar. Shawn propped his chin on Lassie’s head and looked back at the cemetery path, where people were milling around and Jules, Gus, and his dad were all coming towards them. He had really meant it, ten minutes ago, when he had promised into the microphone that he would come around and talk to everyone. But now Shawn knew that he _wasn’t_ going to do that. He was going to stay crouched on this sidewalk for as long as Lassie was here. And when Lassie was done being on the sidewalk, Shawn would go with him wherever he went next. Maybe the ER. That was probably a good next stop.

***

Carlton was aware that he really should have been embarrassed, but he was also aware that Shawn was alive, and proving his alive-ness by being warm and solid. Since his mind was still only really capable of thinking about one thing at a time, Carlton focused on the whole “Shawn is alive” bit and ignored everything else. This meant that when O’Hara parked his Crown Vic outside the hospital and Shawn, who was in the back seat next to Carlton, said, “OK, bud, come on, we’re gonna get your hand looked at,” Carlton was a little fuzzy on the details of how they’d gotten there.

Shawn pulled Carlton out of the car, and kept an arm wrapped around his waist the whole way into the hospital. Carlton held his right hand out in front of him and, mostly for lack of anywhere else to put it, used his left hand to help hold his right one up, gripping it by the wrist. He hadn’t thought it was bleeding that much, but apparently even slowly bleeding wounds would eventually cover your entire hand in blood if you didn’t do anything to them except hide them in your pocket. It was like he had a glove of blood on, which was kind of morbidly fascinating. Guster, who had seen his hand briefly before Carlton had been loaded into the back of his own car, had not seemed to agree.

After a relatively short time in the ER--and after some badges had been flashed, helping to keep that time short--Carlton had to go into a room on his own and try to pay attention as his hand was cleaned and super-glued and splinted back to what was, technically, the right shape for a hand. They gave him a prescription for fairly strong painkillers, but he had ibuprofen at home and just stuck the scrip in his pocket without paying much attention to it. He felt, the whole time, as though half of his attention was in an entirely different room. He even felt like he could feel specifically the direction and shape of where Shawn was, even though he knew he was imagining it based on where he knew the waiting room was. Still, he nodded and shook his head quickly to everything the doctors asked--only paying enough attention to make sure they thought he’d had a stupid car-door _accident_ \--and felt a wave of relief when he rounded the corner to the waiting room and saw Shawn sitting in a chair there, next to O’Hara.

“Hey,” said Shawn, also looking slightly relieved, and standing to meet him. “You OK?”

Carlton felt a new wave of emotion that almost made him stagger. This time it was anger. His gut twisted, because he didn’t _want_ to be angry at Shawn, he wanted to be happy he was alive, but he also wasn’t OK, not really, and it felt like Shawn’s fault. “Fine,” he muttered, rather than unpacking all of this. “Let’s go home.”

***

Shawn drove Lassie’s car, this time, so that he could drop off Jules and then take both himself and Lassie to Lassie’s place. Lassie was quiet in the passenger seat, but Shawn wasn’t surprised. It seemed like he’d been letting out all of his bottled up emotions at once, and emotions were tiring things.

“Hey,” he said once he’d parked. “We’re here.”

Lassie kept his head down in the passenger seat, and Shawn reached over and touched his shoulder gently. Lassie jerked away. Hmm. Maybe there were still a few emotions left in the bottle. “Lassie?” said Shawn.

“I think you should go,” said Lassie lowly, not looking at him.

“Oh,” said Shawn. “I mean, of course I will, if you want, but can I ask, uh, why? I know we need to actually talk about it but I kind of thought we had something going here.”

Lassie looked up. He seemed to be going for one of his classic murderous looks, but mostly he looked sad. Shawn’s heart clenched annoyingly. “You should go,” Lassie said. “We don’t--we don’t have a thing. I just--thought you were dead. And you’re not. Great. Now get out of my car.”

Maybe Lassie’d been stuck in the “denial” stage of grief while he actually thought Shawn was dead, and was now going through all the other stages at supersonic speed. Like anger, for example. “Hey,” said Shawn again, because it was his calming word of choice. “Isn’t that a good thing, me not being dead? Look, Lass, out of everyone, I wanted to tell you the most, but I _couldn’t_. It was like--like being undercover. I had to catch the killer! And I did!”

“Leave me _alone_ , Spencer!” barked Lassie, the effect ruined slightly by his voice cracking halfway through.

Shawn raised his hands in surrender. “OK,” he said quietly. “I’ll go. I’m going to sit on the curb and call Gus for a ride. And, uh, watch to make sure you get into your house OK. Here.”

Lassie took his keys from Shawn without comment, and scrabbled to open his car door. Shawn got out, stood by the car, and watched Lassie walk up and unlock his front door left-handedly. Lassie stopped on the threshold a minute with his door still closed; Shawn tried to figure out if he was struggling, or just pausing. It looked like just a pause. But then he went into his house, and closed his door behind him without looking back.


	9. Chapter 9

Gus picked Shawn up with no comment except for the look on his face, which spoke volumes. “Let’s get dinner,” said Shawn, “I’m hungry.”

“It’s four-thirty,” Gus pointed out. “Burritos?”

“You know it,” said Shawn. “Burritos are an all-the-time food. Except breakfast.”

“You had a burrito for breakfast last week, Shawn,” said Gus.

“Oh, yeah,” said Shawn. “All right, no exceptions then.”

They drove in silence for a bit, and then Shawn sighed and responded to Gus’s original facial expression. “Lassie just...needs some time.”

“He told you to leave?” said Gus.

“Yeah,” said Shawn, slumping in the seat and putting his feet up on the dash. Gus whacked at his shins without taking his eyes off the road, and Shawn yelped and pulled his legs down again. “OK! Geez. Hey, I’m responsible with cars, I just drove Lassie’s to his house.”

“And then he kicked you out,” said Gus.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t because of my driving,” said Shawn. “Honestly, I’m not sure he really noticed my driving, he’s still kind of out of it. He just seemed...angry, I guess. Or more like he was trying to be angry.”

“I mean, I don’t entirely blame him,” said Gus.

“Gus, you’re my best friend! My BFF! My biffle! You’re supposed to be on my side.”

“OK, but think about how you would feel if you thought Lassie was dead for almost a week,” said Gus reasonably. That is, he was using his reasonable voice, which usually made Shawn feel irrational. This time, though, he had to admit Gus had a point.

“I...wouldn’t feel great,” said Shawn, thinking back to hearing “officer down” on the police scanner. “But, I mean, that’s me, we know how I feel about Lassie, I’ve never _really_ tried to hide it. But how was I supposed to know he, you know, liked me, too? So far, I’ve gotten _at best_ some very mixed signals.”

“ _I_ know that,” said Gus, parking down the road from their favorite food truck to get burritos from. “I mean, he certainly doesn’t hate you--anymore--but he’s a weird guy who’s bad at showing when he likes people. But Shawn, you kind of act like you know _everything_. That’s your whole schtick. And I know Lassie’s always been skeptical that you’re psychic, but when you constantly act like you know everything going on, he’s going to end up buying into it a little. So when you fake your own death and leave him devastated, do you think he’s thinking, ‘Oh, Shawn didn’t know I’d feel like this,’ or do you think he’s thinking, ‘Shawn knew and didn’t care’?”

Shawn hated it when Gus made so much sense about interpersonal relationships, and also when he used the word “schtick.” He made a mocking face just to buy himself time as he thought about what Gus had said. “I don’t think _Lassie_ knew he was going to be so ‘devastated,’” he pointed out, putting finger quotes around the word.

“So? Shawn, you constantly prove that you know things Lassie doesn’t,” said Gus. “Maybe he thinks you know him better than he knows himself.”

“Well, that’s just dumb,” said Shawn, huffing.

“He’s also probably not really thinking straight right now,” Gus allowed. Shawn leered, and Gus punched him in the arm. “You know what I mean. I think giving him time is fine. But also, you could, you know, tell him you’re sorry. And that you didn’t know he’d be so sad.”

“That’s it? That’ll fix it?” said Shawn.

“I don’t know, _I’m_ not psychic either!” said Gus. “For now, let’s get food. We missed lunch, and I’m hungry. Maybe it’ll all make more sense after a burrito.”

***

Carlton woke up, gasping, and rolled off of his bed. He’d been lying on it mostly fully clothed; at the hospital, they’d splinted his fingers while he was still wearing his black suit jacket, and once he’d gotten home and taken ten minutes or so to frustratingly work the jacket off over the splints, trying to undo any other fastenings with just his left hand had felt like too much work. He’d even left on his holster--of course he’d worn it to the funeral--though he did put his sidearm away.

Now he landed on his left side--managing to at least hold his right hand up so it didn’t hit anything--and lay there feeling the holster press into the mostly-forgotten bruises from the drug bust. It felt eerily like when he’d fallen off his couch while watching _Cops_ , thinking that Shawn was dead.

It felt _too_ much like that. Carlton rolled to his front and pressed his face to the rug in his dark bedroom. Shawn wasn’t dead, he wasn’t. The events of the day were still hazy, but Carlton remembered the funeral, right, and he remembered Shawn being onstage, and Shawn putting his arms around him--and then Carlton had come home and sat on his couch for a few hours, and then kicked off his shoes and gone to bed. Where was Shawn? He’d told him to leave, maybe. Why? He was angry at him. Angry that he’d faked his death, and made Carlton unhappy. Only, Carlton was the one who’d told him to leave, and his absence definitely wasn’t making Carlton happier.

Carlton pushed himself to his knees and felt around for his phone on his nightstand, and had another rush of deja vu. The last time he’d wanted to call Shawn, he’d known that no one would answer. What if that still happened? Honestly, everything from the past five days or so was pretty hazy. He knew he hadn’t actually seen Shawn die, but the images of his death were still there in Carlton’s mind. What if the images of Shawn alive after all were also some kind of cruel, imaginary dream?

That wasn’t true. It couldn’t be. He could remember the feeling of Shawn’s arms. He pulled up Shawn’s contact quickly, before he could stop himself. In the past five days, Carlton had learned of his friend’s--his crush’s--death, and gone to his funeral; he’d helped in a drug bust, and been shot at by a gang member. He’d slammed his hand in a car door. Pressing “call” by Shawn’s name was the scariest thing he’d ever done.

The phone rang four times, and Carlton got closer to hyperventilating with every ring. Then someone picked up, and Shawn said, “Lassie?”

***

At first Lassie didn’t say anything back, but Shawn could hear his breath hitching. Eventually, he said, “You’re alive.”

“Yeah,” said Shawn, rolling onto his back in bed and blinking fast. “Yeah, Lass, I’m alive.”

“Sorry,” said Lassie, and Shawn wasn’t sure if he meant for yelling earlier or calling at four in the morning, but it didn’t matter.

“Nothing to be sorry for,” he said. Lassie breathed shakily into the phone some more, seemingly content to just stay on the line. “Hey, uh, Lass--Carlton,” said Shawn. “Do you want--is it OK if I come over?”

“Come over,” Lassie echoed, which didn’t quite sound like an invitation.

“I’d like to,” said Shawn honestly. “If you’re OK with that.”

“OK,” said Lassie. It was another echo, but it also sounded like acceptance.

“Great,” said Shawn, jumping up and looking around for his least dirty pair of jeans. “I could possibly stay on the phone with you until I get there, but it would mean driving my motorcycle one-handed.”

“Don’t do that,” said Lassie, sounding slightly more like his normal self.

“I won’t,” said Shawn. “See you in a few.”


	10. Chapter 10

Shawn parked his bike in a halo of light from a streetlamp, on the street outside Lassie’s house. He considered knocking, and then just went ahead and used Lassie’s extra house key. The guy was more careful of his extra key than Gus, keeping it locked up in a little combination-lock thing hidden under his front steps, but since the combo was the year of that Civil War battle that he really liked, Shawn had always been able to get to it pretty easily.

“Hello,” he called once he was inside. There didn’t seem to be any lights on. “Just me.”

“In here,” said Lassie, from his dark bedroom. He sounded surprisingly unworried that Shawn had just walked into his locked house with no issues. Shawn braced himself, not sure what he would find.

He did not expect it to be Lassie lying on his back on the floor, fully clothed, but that’s what it was. “Hi,” said Shawn, flicking on the lights and making them both squint. Lassie’s phone was still clutched in his left hand, though it was down by his side.

“Hi,” said Lassie, and his face crumpled a little. Shawn went to him and knelt down, quickly, but Lassie pushed himself up and turned away, poking at the belt tie-downs of his holster but hampered by the fact that one of his hands was splinted and the other was still holding his phone. “I couldn’t get it off,” he muttered, tugging fruitlessly. “I couldn’t--I can’t--”

It probably didn’t help any that his hands were trembling, too. Shawn reached out and gently--super gently--took Lassie’s wrists, and pulled his hands towards himself, forcing Lassie to turn and look at him. “Lassie,” said Shawn. He thought for a second, then tugged Lassie’s phone until Lassie let it go, took Lassie’s un-broken hand in both of his own, and sat all the way down, so that they were sitting on the floor, turned towards each other. “Lassie. I need to tell you something. I’m not psychic.”

Lassie frowned a little, and said, “I know.”

“I know you never really believed it,” said Shawn, leaning forward a little. “But think about what that means. I’m _not psychic_. I’m super observant, and I have a really really good memory, but I don’t solve cases through any kind of superpowers, I poke around and remember things and do detective work. And I don’t _know_ things through any kind of superpowers. I’m good at reading people, but I get things wrong sometimes, or even miss them entirely. Because I’m human.”

Shawn paused expectantly, and Lassie blinked, and then said, “OK.” He paused, too, looked away, and muttered, “I’m not going to arrest you.”

“That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me,” said Shawn, grinning, and then got a little more serious. “Lassie, what I’m saying is, uh, I didn’t know you’d be so sad.” Lassie frowned some more, and Shawn went on, “I didn’t want to hurt you. I _never_ want to hurt you. I knew you’d be, you know, not happy, but I _didn’t_ know you cared this much and I’m really flattered and glad you do, but I didn’t want to find out _this_ way. I made a mistake. And I’m really, really sorry.”

Lassie looked away, and looked back, and then whispered, “You were dead.”

“Oh, Lassie,” said Shawn, swallowing hard.

“You were _dead_ ,” said Lassie, “and I never--we never-- _Shawn_ \--”

“Carlton,” said Shawn this time, and scooched closer and wrapped his arms around him. Lassie grabbed on, one-handed. “I know.”

***

Carlton’s sense of time had been on the fritz lately, and he was entirely unsure of how long he and Shawn sat on his bedroom floor, holding each other. Eventually, though, Shawn pulled back and started to undo Carlton’s holster. “Shawn,” he said, uncertainly.

“It looks a little uncomfortable,” said Shawn. “And I’m ‘sensing’--” he waved his hand around by his head and then laughed-- “that you’re having a little trouble with fastenings right now, since you, uh, broke three of your fingers and possibly some other hand bones, too. What exactly did you do, anyway?”

“Slammed it in a car door,” muttered Carlton, pulling his arms out of the holster as Shawn took it off of him.

Shawn had stood up to put away Carlton’s holster--heading for the right place, too, which figured--but he stopped and looked down at Carlton with an eyebrow raised. “On purpose?” he said.

Carlton pulled up his knees and buried his face in them, which, he realized, was pretty much an answer on its own. After a moment, Shawn’s hand landed on his back, making him jump a little, and he waited for Shawn to say something serious and concerned. “Have you considered a stress ball?” said Shawn, lightly. Carlton un-buried his face and looked at Shawn. “Or therapy,” said Shawn, a little more seriously, “but I figured we could start small.”

Carlton shrugged. “You’re right,” said Shawn, apparently happy to carry on a conversation with only himself talking--which wasn’t actually a surprise. “We can talk about it later. For now--that still doesn’t look _comfy_ , and I’m betting shirt buttons are tricky, too.”

Shawn pulled out clothes for Carlton to change into--a T-shirt and pajama pants, which made him look at his alarm clock and say, “I have work today.”

It was slightly after 5am. Shawn looked at the clock, too, and then said, “Dude, it’s Sunday. I’ll write you a note. Seriously, Lass, what are you planning to do with no right hand?” Carlton gave in, partly because he apparently had no choice. Shawn hauled him to his feet, sat him on the edge of his bed, and started to undo his shirt buttons.

By the time Shawn had untied his tie, eased his button-down off over his right hand, helped him pull the T-shirt on, and reached the level of his belt, Carlton started to feel a little uneasy. “Shawn,” he said.

“Just helping with the buttons,” said Shawn, stepping back once the belt and top button on his pants were undone. “I’ll let you do the actual pants changing.” He didn’t leave, but he did walk away across the room, so Carlton got up and pulled off his pants, self-consciously, and reached for the pajama pants. Then he looked up and found that Shawn was also suddenly pants-less, wearing only a sweatshirt and boxers, his jeans pooled on the floor nearby.

“Shawn!” he said.

Shawn held up another pair of Carlton’s pajama pants. “I’m borrowing these,” he said. He paused and cocked his head at Carlton. “All I’m planning is to hang out and be comfy,” he said, “for right now. But, uh, Carlton, in case you didn’t figure it out, this isn’t, like, a bros being bros thing for me. I like you. Like, I _like_ like you.”

Of course Shawn had a third-grade vocabulary when it came to romantic declarations. Carlton swallowed and picked up the pajama pants, just for something to do with his hand, and then said, “I like you, too.”

“Do you _like_ like me?” said Shawn, grinning. He pulled the pajama pants he was holding on, apparently serious about borrowing them, and stalked across the floor towards Carlton, who swallowed again and held his own pants in front of him. Shawn put his hands on Carlton’s ribs. “Hey,” he said, “I’m OK with this going at whatever speed. Except maybe reverse, though we’ve already done things kind of out of order--you’ve been to my funeral, after all. But I’m in this for real. And for kisses, and for, you know, sexy times. And for you.”

Carlton felt his face blazing, and realized that if Shawn _used_ a third-grade vocabulary--or, they might have been edging towards middle school now--then he was _getting embarrassed_ by a third-grade vocabulary, so maybe they deserved each other. He sure hoped they did. He knew that he wanted the same thing Shawn did, though he wouldn’t have used the same words. In fact, he wasn’t sure what words to use. So instead he dropped the pajama pants onto the floor, put his hands on Shawn’s shoulders--his right hand couldn’t really grip, but he could rest it there--and leaned forward.

Shawn tightened his grip on Carlton’s ribs, and met him halfway. They kissed until the bruise on his side twinged under Shawn’s hand, and Carlton pulled away reluctantly, wincing a little. “Sorry,” said Shawn, immediately, and traced the exact outline of the bruise over Carlton’s T-shirt, like a magic trick. “I saw that was there--where you got shot in the vest?--but I forgot for a minute. Doesn’t happen often.”

“I forgot, too,” said Carlton, realizing that it was true. Maybe he didn’t need a stress ball _or_ to slam his hand in any more doors. Maybe he just needed to be able to kiss Shawn all the time. Now that they’d stopped, there were some emotions welling up again, but mostly what he was feeling was exhaustion. “I’m tired,” he said.

“Me, too,” said Shawn. “You know how they say ‘you can sleep when you’re dead’? Sure didn’t happen for me.” He grabbed the pajama pants off the floor and handed them to Carlton. “Is it OK if I use your bed? While you are also using it?”

Some time later, Carlton woke with a gasp and rolled over. A hand landed on his hip and caught him before he reached the edge of the mattress. “What was that?” slurred Shawn, obviously only half awake, as he tugged on Carlton until he rolled back towards the middle of the bed.

“I dunno,” said Carlton honestly. Shawn had one eye open and his hair was messier than Carlton had ever seen it. His thumb rubbed gently and aimlessly over the waistband of Carlton’s pants. “Bad dream, I guess.”

“OK,” said Shawn, and tugged some more. “Go back to sleep. It’s early.”

Carlton rolled again, putting his back to Shawn, who latched on immediately and tangled his legs with Carlton’s. This left Carlton with a good view of his alarm clock in the no-longer quite as dark room. “It’s seven forty.”

“Early,” agreed Shawn, against Carlton’s neck. He shifted just enough to plant a sleepy kiss at the base of Carlton’s hairline, then somehow snuggled even closer. “Sleep. No work. Time for everything else later.”

As terrible as his sleep schedule had been lately, Carlton wasn’t sure if he’d be able to fall back asleep at this time. But he didn’t really mind. He closed his eyes and drifted, feeling Shawn’s arm around his waist, fingers twitching against his stomach, and Shawn’s chest rising and falling against his back. Shawn sighed a little and Carlton felt it more than heard it, Shawn’s breath warm and damp on his neck. He felt himself relax a little further. He wasn’t sure what exactly “everything else” would constitute, especially with someone like Shawn Spencer. But he knew that Shawn was right, because they were both there and both alive: there would be time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end! Again, this is (so far) the most popular thing I've ever posted, by pretty much any metric, so thank you so much to those of you commenting, following, reading, etc. I hope you liked it.
> 
> I will post more _Psych_ fic (let's be real, it is all Shassie fic too) in the future, though possibly not immediately! I am actually almost finished watching the show now, so I have even more material to work with, plus some stuff I've already drafted. But also, I am actually almost finished watching the show now, and then it might be good for me to take a break from _Psych_ stuff...for like a day or two. We'll see.
> 
> Oh, and also: no, Carlton, kissing Shawn any time you feel emotions is _not_ a healthy coping mechanism, at least not if it's your only one. But Shawn will make him go to therapy, too (or, you know, at least get a stress ball) so...they'll be OK.


End file.
